As the agent performance-optimization market continues to mature, contact center vendors continue to develop new, more innovative releases to differentiate themselves from competitors in an effort to stay afloat. A new report by Frost & Sullivan, "World Agent Performance Optimization Software Markets," covers this trend as it moves more to the center of the stage.
"We found that there is, to some extent, some degree of saturation in certain segments in this market," says Seema Lall, industry analyst for Frost & Sullivan and author of the report. "As a result of that we find that vendors have to constantly reinvent themselves with new initiatives and new releases, look to expand the scope of traditional applications, and focus on production differentiation strategies...to survive."
Presenting financial information from 2003, the report analyzes the workforce management market--which it reports as currently $203.7 million and expects to more than double to $522.8 million by 2010--and the quality monitoring market (at $394.3 million and expected to skyrocket to $1.2 billion in six years). Additional report findings focus on performance optimization and e-learning software, as well as market forecasts and strategic growth suggestions.
Lall tells CRM magazine that the market is benefiting from low penetration rates within small to medium-size contact centers, as well as from the projected rapid growth of the overseas contact center market. In addition, there is a current-and-upcoming replacement cycle of first-generation products and contact-center infrastructure refreshes that will further drive the upgrade business for this market.
The top-three vendors in this category are, according to the report, Aspect, Blue Pumpkin, and IEX, with Blue Pumpkin receiving its top rank in workforce management-software licenses worldwide. "Blue Pumpkin is the only workforce management vendor to offer a holistic performance optimization solution," Lall says. "The significance and potential of performance optimization applications is so attractive that currently, vendors from both quality monitoring [and] workforce management are offering performance optimization modules of some sort."

Doron Aspitz, chairman and CEO of Blue Pumpkin, credits the recognition to his team's commitment to service: "What's important is the spirit of the company, and that is one of really truly coming through for every customer out there."
NICE, Verint, and Witness were cited as the top-three contenders for quality monitoring solutions. Lall attributes a significant growth area within the sector to the incorporation of advanced analytical capabilities within the solution. "Analytical solutions--with their data mining, word spotting, and trend analysis capabilities--hold the key to getting information contained within contact center recordings quickly and cost effectively," Lall says. "Once translated, this data can then be shared throughout the enterprise and...can potentially increase performance and profitability."
The expected increase in quality monitoring is significantly greater than its workforce management counterpart, but Lall bases this on less saturation: "Quality monitoring has a lower saturation rate [in] its end-user base....[C]oupled with higher current market growth rate, [it] prompts the basis for greater revenue projection."
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